[Moffo]

Hi, This may seem like a silly question, but here goes anyway.

We have a new garden and I would like to have a border on 3 sides of the lawn.
There is also a bank on 3 sides as well. I am planning on having the border about 2 metres wide all round, as the garden is about 25m x 12m. I would like to plant a mixture of Trees, Shrubs and Ground Cover plants.

The question is, do you put down weed control fabric, if you are planning on having a ground cover plant that will need to spread ?

Thanks for your advice.

[medieval knievel]

in my (limited) experience, weed control fabric is only good for a year or two, if you're putting down bark mulch on top. leaves, etc., landing on the bark mulch and rotting with the bark provide a growing medium.

[James Kilkelly, was GPI.]

[brian.shaugh]

would agree with other comments. Weeds will grow on top of the membrane if there is bark mulch on it. However they would be easily hand weeded out.
Secret to weeds is just to keep on top of them, don't let them get out of control but spending 5 minutes every week pulling them up.

[Sarah Evans]

Depending on the quality of the weed membrame you should get more than a couple of years out of them. Whenever we are doing any improvements I find the membrame that the previous owner used and that was over 12 years ago that he put it down

The one issue I have with it is that if you use it in an area with any element of foot traffic it is prone to compaction. Our own soil is clay and all that happens is you get a layer of clay that the membrame clogs so the water just sits on the top.

In terms of an environmental aspect it is not the greatest of products and you could always use cardboard instead with a good layer of mulch on top.
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[brian.shaugh]

Cardboard - thats actually a really good idea thanks